Find a Field Method

GPH 491 Find a Field Method

Purpose of this Assignment: There will come a time for almost all professional geographers when they will need to teach themselves a method. For some of you, this time may have already come when you had to teach yourself a GIS method, a statistical method, or even a field method. However, very few undergraduate students have had to digest a method in a professional scholarly article and translate the information in that article into step-by-step guidelines. That’s the goal of this assignment!

Instructions:

Step 1: Find a geographical journal. [e.g. Professional Geographer, Annals of the Association of American Geographers, Association of Pacific Coast Geographers Yearbook are general journals. There are many others that you have encountered in extra readings in different courses.] Any geographical journal will be acceptable.]

Note: http://lib.asu.edu/ has these and other geographical journals available online.

Step 2: Surf the journal articles and fine one paper that describes a field method. If the article uses more than one field method, it is fine for you to pick the method that interests you the most.

Step 3: Fill out the form below, print out this form, and turn it in. You do not have to turn in a copy of the journal article. We will find the article ourselves, using your citation and the ASU library. If you got the article from a source other than a PDF file accessible from the ASU library, then please attach a copy of your article.

Your Name Ron Dorn Article Allen CA (2009) Monitoring environmental impact in the upper Sonoran lifestyle: A new tool Citation for Rapid Ecological Assessment. Environmental Management 43(2): 346-356. (using same style as used by the Note: You can download the article at this link: journal) http://alliance.la.asu.edu/gph491/Spring2011/Allen_FAM_09.pdf Subfield of This article could be placed in biogeography, in environmental geography (cf. GPH 210 Geography material), and it could also be a part of urban geography. that you would place the article Research Dr. Allen asks whether persons living in the Upper Sonoran Lifestyle (homes spread out amongst question the Sonoran Desert like those found in North Scottsdale and Cave Creek) disturb the soil- asked in the vegetation interactions along trails. The focused question he asked is whether a rapid field article assessment method (FAM) could be used to monitor anthropogenic impacts. Summarize Step 1. Select the study sites. the step-by- Step 1a. Select the main multi-use trail control site using criteria in the literature (in this case, step trying to find the ideal Upper Sonoran Lifestyle location) instructions Step 1b. Find nearby other sites for comparison, where the other sites have both similar and on how you different characteristics. would Step 1c. Locate a very different comparison site that has no characteristics of the Upper implement Sonoran Lifestyle, but is still on the urban fringe this method. Random Sampling Technique in study site selection: although the general area was predetermined using criteria in the literature, the exact location of the transects (perpendicular to This section the trail) was selected using a random sampling technique (not specified). should be in your words, Step 2. Lay out a transect tape perpendicular to the study site at every 0.3 meter intervals from since you the center of the trail to 3 meters on either side. Also, take a panoramic photographic sequence are “taking of each transect. notes” on what you Step 3. Record data using the following pre-made tables. would do should you need to use this method. and Step 4. Analyze data, mostly using graphs of how the different disturbance parameters changed with distance from the trail.

Step 5. Answer the question. In this case, Dr. Allen determined that rapid field assessment method (FAM) could indeed be used to monitor anthropogenic impacts along trails in the Upper Sonoran Lifestyle area, as exemplified by distance-decay changes in different disturbance parameters. What • A transect tape that could be laid out perpendicular to the trail and would be about 6 meters special long equipment • A camera would you need to use this method? Please This technique would be quite useful to monitor the impact of people on trails in other locations brainstorm in the Sonoran Desert. This technique would complement rephotography as a technique, and it here about would also complement analysis of repeat aerial photographs at the same location. one research question you might be able to answer with this method. What level The professor picked this paper as an example, because I felt that the paper would be something of that a professional geographer could use with relatively little training. confidence do you have Another reason why this paper was selected is because different disturbance parameters could be that you “invented/created/generated” to fit different circumstances. For example, if trails were located in could use desert pavements, biological soil crust parameters could be replaced with the disturbance of the this method desert pavement. as a professional geographer ? Just explain your feelings in words.